Page:History of Woman Suffrage Volume 6.djvu/293

 lecturer and writer and addressed suffrage conventions in many States. Beginning with 1870 he contributed a long series of brilliant editorials to the Woman's Journal. He wrote four books on the woman question and gave 1,000 books about women to the Boston Public Library. The founder of Smith College said she was led to leave her fortune for that purpose by reading his article, Ought Women Learn the Alphabet?

1912. The State annual meeting was held in Boston, October It, with an unusually large attendance from western Massachusetts. In 1913 it met in Boston May 27, 28. The executive secretary, Mrs. Marion Booth Kelley, reported that 111 indoor meetings and 45 outdoor meetings had been held in the past six months. It was voted to have a suffrage parade in Boston the following spring. There was much doubt of the propriety of this but when a rising vote of the women present was taken to see how many would march almost the whole convention rose.

1914. The State annual meeting was held in Boston May 1 and 2, and again in 1915 on May 13-15. The latter opened with a brilliant banquet at the Hotel Somerset, attended by about 800. Mrs. Park presided and among the speakers were ex-Governor Bass of New Hampshire, ex-Governor Foss of Massachusetts, Dr. Hugh Cabot and Mrs. Judith W. Smith, aged 93. Suffrage clubs were reported at Wellesley, Smith and Mt. Holyoke Colleges, the last formed largely through Miss Mildred Blodgett, assistant professor of geology. A band concert and a mass meeting on the Common closed the convention.

1916. At the State annual meeting in Boston May 18, 19, dues were abolished and provision made for organizing the State along political party lines, as recommended by the National Association. Mrs. B. F. Pitman of Brookline gave a large reception. The treasurer reported receipts of $67,232, expenditures of $63,483.

1917. At the annual State meeting on May 10 resolutions were adopted calling upon the 125,000 enrolled members to "show their patriotism by doing their utmost to help their country